The moment that the black wall telephone rang early on the morning of Sept. 29, 1978, in Stefania Falasca's Rome apartment is imprinted in her mind. Then 15, Falasca remembers her father answering and hearing the voice of her uncle, a priest who worked at the Vatican, coming through the receiver: “The pope is dead!”
“But he's already dead!” Falasca recalled her bewildered father exclaiming.
